The Choice E-Book

Edith Wharton

• Herausgeber: DigiCat
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

In Edith Wharton's novel 'The Choice,' readers are taken on a journey through the complexities of human nature and society's expectations. The book explores themes of love, duty, and societal norms in the Gilded Age. Wharton's prose is elegant and sophisticated, capturing the essence of the time period and the inner turmoil of the characters. The narrative style is rich in detail and character development, offering a vivid portrayal of the privileged class and the struggles they face. 'The Choice' is a compelling work that delves deep into the human psyche, questioning the choices we make and the consequences that follow. Edith Wharton, known for her keen insight into social mores and class distinctions, drew inspiration from her own experiences in high society to write 'The Choice.' Her nuanced understanding of human behavior and societal expectations shines through in this novel, making it a timeless classic that continues to resonate with readers today. I highly recommend 'The Choice' to readers who enjoy thought-provoking literature that delves into the intricacies of human relationships and societal pressures. Edith Wharton's masterful storytelling and insightful commentary make this novel a must-read for anyone interested in the complexities of the human condition.

Leseprobe

Edith Wharton

The Choice

1916

 

EAN 8596547329558

DigiCat, 2022 Contact: [email protected]

Table of Contents

Cover

Titlepage

Text

I

Table of Contents

Stilling, that night after dinner, had surpassed himself. He always did, Wrayford reflected, when the small fry from Highfield came to dine. He, Cobham Stilling, who had to find his bearings and keep to his level in the big heedless ironic world of New York, dilated and grew vast in the congenial medium of Highfield. The Red House was the biggest house of the Highfield summer colony, and Cobham Stilling was its biggest man. No one else within a radius of a hundred miles (on a conservative estimate) had as many horses, as many greenhouses, as many servants, and assuredly no one else had three motors and a motor-boat for the lake.

The motor-boat was Stilling’s latest hobby, and he rode—or steered—it in and out of the conversation all the evening, to the obvious edification of every one present save his wife and his visitor, Austin Wrayford. The interest of the latter two who, from opposite ends of the drawing-room, exchanged a fleeting glance when Stilling again launched his craft on the thin current of the talk—the interest of Mrs. Stilling and Wrayford had already lost its edge by protracted contact with the subject.

But the dinner-guests—the Rector, Mr. Swordsley, his wife Mrs. Swordsley, Lucy and Agnes Granger, their brother Addison, and young Jack Emmerton from Harvard—were all, for divers reasons, stirred to the proper pitch of feeling. Mr. Swordsley, no doubt, was saying to himself: “If my good parishioner here can afford to buy a motor-boat, in addition to all the other expenditures which an establishment like this must entail, I certainly need not scruple to appeal to him again for a contribution for our Galahad Club.” The Granger girls, meanwhile, were evoking visions of lakeside picnics, not unadorned with the presence of young Mr. Emmerton; while that youth himself speculated as to whether his affable host would let him, when he came back on his next vacation, “learn to run the thing himself”; and Mr. Addison Granger, the elderly bachelor brother of the volatile Lucy and Agnes, mentally formulated the precise phrase in which, in his next letter to his cousin Professor Spildyke of the University of East Latmos, he should allude to “our last delightful trip in my old friend Cobham Stilling’s ten-thousand-dollar motor-launch”—for East Latmos was still in that primitive stage of culture on which five figures impinge.